Finders Keepers

The world of Age Of Wonders is just one victim of this plague,
thrown into chaos by the arrival of humanity in a haven where
elves, halflings, faeries, dwarves, and other pointy-eared types
used to live in harmony.

The Elven Court which once ruled the land has been destroyed by the
humans, and the Lord Inioch killed. His people have split into two
main factions, each led by one of his children.

The Keepers are a bunch of tree-huggers, willing to forgive the
humans and build a new land in peace. Fight for them and you will
lead an army of dwarves, halflings, and elves.

The Cult Of Storms on the other hand want revenge, and are
determined to wipe out both the humans and the Keepers. Their
armies are made up of dark elves, goblins and orcs.

Here ends the history lesson.

Turn It Up

Isn't it pretty?

Age Of Wonders is a turn-based
strategy game, something of a rariety these days. It might not
have the fast action of its real time brethren, but the more
sedate pace allows it to be far deeper and more involving.

Cities can be occupied and put to work building more units for your
army. You can fortify them, upgrade them, or even replace their
inhabitants with members of another race if you are having problems
keeping them in line.

Mines and farms are scattered across the map, and capturing them
can increase your flow of income. There are also watch towers to
give you a better view of your surroundings, monster-plagued ruins
to loot, and dungeons which you can rescue prisoners from.

When two hostile armies meet you can choose to let the computer
work out the result, or control your army in person. Battles are
fairly small scale, as each army can only contain up to eight
units, and each battle can only have up to four armies in it.

But with a wide range of units there is still plenty of room for
cunning tactics. Archers are good at long range, but are useless in
close combat. Spell casters can be very powerful, but leave them
out in the open and enemy cavalry can rip them to shreds.

Unfortunately the AI tends to just send its entire force streaming
towards you at full speed, meaning that units often arrive in a
steady dribble according to how fast they can move, rather than
appearing in a nice formation.

Still, as the game goes on the scenarios get much more challenging,
and although the AI never seems to master basic tactics it does
become a more proficient strategist, raiding undefended mines and
cities, robbing you of much needed resources.

Deeper

Researching spells

And there's more...

Spells can be researched during a scenario, giving you access to
more powerful magic. But you generate a limited amount of mana
(boosted by capturing power nodes), and you have to balance that
between researching new spells and ensuring that your spellcasters
have enough mana to use their existing spells in battle.

Some of your units can be kept from one scenario to the next, but
you only have a limited number of points to spend on this. You have
to pick which units you really want, and balance them against the
possibility of carrying more gold or mana into the next scenario
instead.

When doing this you have to remember that you are often short on
money, and you will need it to pay your units. If you start a
scenario with too many units and run out of money, you will start
to see your men deserting you as their wages go unpaid for days on
end. A bit like the Russian army, really...

Each side can recruit a small cast of heroes, which you develop as
you would a character in a role playing game. Every time one goes
up a level you are given points to spend on buying the hero new
skills, or adding extra points to their stats.

You can also find magical items, armour and weapons to equip your
heroes with, making them even more powerful. Again, these can be
carried from one scenario to the next, but it will cost you.

By the end of the game your own character can be a one man (or
woman) slaughterhouse, capable of scything through entire armies
single handedly. You still have to be careful though, because if
you lose your leader the game is over.

In fact the whole game is intricately balanced, and no single unit
or strategy can triumph in every situation. It is a real tribute to
the developers that it works so well.

Cartoon Violence

My giants go for a rumble in a Dark Elf town

Turn
based strategy games aren't exactly known for their visuals,
but Age Of Wonders looks absolutely gorgeous... The graphics
are colourful and detailed, and if you have the hardware to
handle it you can play the game at ridiculously high
resolutions.

My own lowly P2-300 (armed with an ageing RivaTNT graphics card)
could run the game smoothly at 800x600, and even at that resolution
the game looks great. If I put up with five second delays waiting
for units to move and a mouse cursor that moved slower than a
glacier, I could even reach 1600x1200.

Each race has its own unique graphics and units, and despite being
represented by tiny little animated sprites they still manage to be
full of character and easy to identify. Spell effects are also
spectacular, with huge clouds of brightly coloured particles
spraying across the battlefield as units unleash magic on each
other.

The game also has a strong sense of humour. For example, there is a
"Geyser" spell which creates a fountain of water under an enemy
unit, lifting it high into the air. The water flow then stops, and
for a moment the unit hangs in mid air, Wily Coyote style, before
plummeting earthwards.

This game is not for children though. Take the Goblin bombers,
which carry huge black bombs around on their backs and hop from
foot to foot as they move. They might look cute, but let one get
too close to your units and it will blow itself up, causing a vast
amount of damage as it disintegrates into a little pool of blood.

Battlefields often end up soaked with blood and covered in corpses,
as the little sprites run around hacking each other up with axes
and swords, lobbing boulders at their enemies, and firing off
spectacular spells.

Conclusion

Age Of Wonders proves that there is still life
in turn based strategy games. The graphics are beautiful, the
gameplay is addictive, and everything is balanced almost to
perfection.

And with the ability to go back and play through scenarios in
control of any of the main races, as well as multiplayer over
Heat.net, LANs, and internet, and even a play by e-mail option, the
game certainly has plenty of replay potential.